Recording Industry Apparently Can't Find A Bunch Of Its Stars To Pay

from the apparently-they-don't-look-very-hard dept

The EFF's Fred von Lohman is noticing that SoundExchange, the RIAA spinoff group in charge of collecting and distributing royalties from satellite radio and webcasting, is having trouble finding certain artists they owe money to. That might not be that surprising, if the artists were obscure. However, included on the list are a fair number of pretty well-known, major label artists that they absolutely should be able to reach -- especially since SoundExchange has members of all the major labels on its board. It's worth noting, of course, that if SoundExchange "can't find" these artists to give them their money, it gets to keep the money for itself. The recording industry always likes to set itself up as doing what it does for the best interest of the artists -- and politicians and members of the press often present the RIAA as representing musicians. Doing things this blatant doesn't help the record labels convince anyone that their position is in support of musicians, and it seems like it's about time that people stop letting the labels present themselves as taking any position for the sake of the same musicians they apparently don't want to pay.

Reader Comments

We really tried hard

I don't really know who this "Sting" guy is but we tried really hard to find them. And "Axl Rose"? Who the hell is he? Oh well, since we can't find them I guess that means we'll just have to keep all that money for ourselves.

Get out.....you've got to be kidding!

No Way!! Somebody all the major labels associate with is doing something sneaky and underhanded?!?!? Stop the press!! (Who is that? Don't mind her, she's just Vicky Vale!) Or you may know her better as the RIAA.

I just can't believe the RIAA who crucifies everyone they can would even allow such atrocities, let alone take part in the unmentionables that they sanction with every breath they take! Yet Madonna can't even crucify herself without the world having an apocalyptic shimmy shake! Makes me wonder who deserves the bad press more....the RIAA or the American Family Association.

I guess the Joker summed up those two organizations best with the line.....
"Have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?" Cuz heaven forbid there be day light on the inner workings of the RIAA or the American Family Association......all hell would freeze over and the world may be set right.

Stingy RIAA

Helluvan idea

You know, I just can't seem to find the federal government. I guess I don't have to pay my income tax next April. Oh, and it's really tough to find the cable company, so I'll just keep the money I was going to pay for my high speed access.

This reminds me of that old Steve Martin bit where he says you can use the words "I forgot" to get out of anything.

The only "artist" I would cut them some slack on is K-Fed. It would suit me if nobody could ever find that loser.

Hold up...

The RIAA is trying to get blanket permission to basically go on fishing expeditions into people's PC but it's little cousin SoundExchange can't find a moderately known artist. Maybe the artists need to download some music from a P2P service...

Here's an idea!

lawyers

I'm sure that the Lawyers will find a way to spend most of the money and return a pittance to the artists. Not unlike those class action lawsuits where everyone who gets to "sue" the company gets a free cup of coffee, and the lawyers get several million dollars each.

no 14

And the Record Industry Corruption Continues

Oh there's a shocker! You mean that the a segment of the record industry doesn't want to pay their artists so that they can keep the money for themselves? Why that's just crazy. These guys need to be shaken down hard and regulated to the max. These artists work hard and deserve their cut.
http://electrogeek.com/blog

good

They called 411 in L.A. and there is no listing for "Bono". There is a listing in Palm Springs, but that's for a "Sonny Bono" and it is disconnected. Oh, well, we'll just have to keep all these royalties.

Why aren't the royalties set aside in escrow? That would make perfect business sesnse for the RIAA which is a "nonprofit" oragnization. I wish the artists would take a stand against these thieving leeches.

False Positives

I at least know stories of two people that have had false positives, getting a check meant for some other recording artist with the same name. Money's still good though! The world's a big place. It'd be nice to know why the origanization doesn't have a proper address though... shame on the artist if they're not keep them updated so they can get paid.